


A Word for the Almost-Home

by Yrindor



Series: Sports Anime Shipping Olympics 2016 Fills [43]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Domestic Bliss, Fluff, Introspection, M/M, Prompt Fic, SASO 2016
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-12
Updated: 2016-07-12
Packaged: 2018-07-23 14:36:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7467114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yrindor/pseuds/Yrindor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Home for Kuroo has always been defined not by the physical place but by the person who's waiting for him there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Word for the Almost-Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [valoirs](https://archiveofourown.org/users/valoirs/gifts).



> Written for Sports Anime Shipping Olympics 2016 Bonus Round 4. The prompt was:
>
>> i want a word for the almost-home.
>> 
>> that point where the highway’s monotony becomes familiar  
> that subway stop whose name will always wake you from day’s-end dozing  
> that first glimpse of the skyline  
> that you never loved until you left it behind.
>> 
>> what do you call the exit sign you see even in your dreams?  
> is there a name for the airport terminal you come back to,  
> comfortably exhausted?
>> 
>> i need a word for rounding your corner onto your street,  
> for seeing your city on the horizon,  
> for flying homewards down your highway.
>> 
>> give me a word for the boundary  
> between the world you went to see  
> and the small one you call your own.
>> 
>> i want a word for the moment you know  
> you’re almost home.
>> 
>> -[source](http://anoraborealis.tumblr.com/post/83884704181)  
> 
> 
>   
> Also fills the "happy ending" square for trope bingo. 

Kuroo never could find the right word to describe it. No matter where he was living or what he was doing, the feeling was always the same -- the sense of safety and peacefulness that came when he was almost back to wherever Kenma was.

He hadn't thought about it much as a child; it had simply been the excitement of knowing that he was almost at his best friend's house, and not having any other best friends for comparison, he had never had reason to think of it as anything special. It was just the happy feeling that he always got at the end of the street that told him he'd get to play with Kenma soon.

Even as they grew older, the feeling didn't really change. Some of the childish excitement faded, but it was replaced by a strong sense of belonging. It didn't matter what had happened that day, or what he needed to do that night, Kenma was always there, and Kenma always welcomed him, even if it was just to sit on the couch and study while Kenma played a game in the background.

He had worried when he left for college. It was the longest the two of them had ever been apart, and he was afraid of what it would feel like when he returned. When he stepped out of the subway and turned down Kenma's street though, he was hit by the same sense of returning and belonging, more poignant now for its absence, and he realized he needn't have worried.

The apartment they rented together as soon as they both finished college was the first time the homelike feelings he associated with Kenma were located in his physical home. Every day when he came home from work, he would step off of the bus and know that he was almost home. And that knowing would start to wash away whatever stresses and worries he had carried home that day until he walked into the apartment and Kenma looked up from his computer screen to greet him, and Kenma's quiet smile would wipe away any last persistent doubts.

The longer he was away, the stronger the feeling became. When he was forced to travel for business, the feeling of almost-home would start as soon as he landed back at the airport, and grow stronger until he finally set foot back inside the door.

It wasn't so much a question of their physical home though as of the person waiting for him inside it. When he would return from a trip while Kenma was away at a conference of his own, the apartment would feel dead and empty, and he would sleep restlessly for the days. When the time finally came for Kenma to return, he swore he could feel the almost-home feeling coming down the street toward him, a warm glow that grew stronger and stronger until finally bursting into its full strength when Kenma, exhausted from traveling and spending days around people with no breaks, opened the door. Those days, they usually fell asleep wrapped around one another on the couch not long afterwards, and woke up stiff the next morning, but refreshed after sleeping soundly for the first time in days.

It wasn't the place that mattered to Kuroo, but the person who was waiting for him there. No matter where they were, be it in their apartment, or in a hotel room halfway around the world the chance time they had conferences in the same place at the same time, it was always the last stretch of the journey to wherever Kenma was that gave him the feeling of almost-home.

And on the first day after they both retired, he realized that the feeling of almost-home no longer had to be a constant in his life unless he wanted it. They didn't have to, but with no more obligations placed on them by their respective jobs, there was nothing stopping them from spending as much time together as they wanted.

They celebrated their first day of retirement by going to the grocery store together, for no reason other than that they could, and then Kuroo made pancakes while Kenma played a game, and they spent the entire day sitting next to each other on the couch, reveling in the feeling of home that, for possibly the first time in their lives, was able to take up far more of their day than the amount of time they spent apart.

**Author's Note:**

> [Kiyala](http://kiyala.dreamwidth.org/) wrote a great fic telling this from Kenma's POV [here](https://sportsanime.dreamwidth.org/16335.html?thread=7701455#cmt7701455).
> 
> As always, comments and feedback are welcome and appreciated.


End file.
